It's a Damn Cold Night
by the narutard imaginator
Summary: Tragic Oneshot, Naruto. NaruHina, onesided NejiHina


There were hot tears running down her cheeks as she cupped her hands over her face. There was no holding them back. It was as if she didn't stop crying, her head would flood.

She held her face miserably, sobbing in the middle of town on a park bench, as if waiting for lightining to strike her so she could just die already. She didn't want to have to go home to him.

Suddenly, from the other end of the street, two curious, gleaming blue eyes wandered to this poor image. The moment a word came out of his mouth, his midnight walk furiously turned in a different direction.

"Oi!" he exclaimed to the girl. He thought he knew who she was, but...

She looked up, her nose red from crying, eyes brimmed with tears. She gasped and turned her face the other way in embarassment after seeing him. The boy looked shocked and ran to the bench, recognizing the girl, and sat next to her and rested his arm around her shoulder. He leaned his face in close.

"W-what's wrong?" he said, a deep worry in his voice. She began choking back her tears again, only fathoming how weak and useless she seemed to him at this time. She clenched her teeth and fists as he now whispered, his face very few centimeters from hers."Hinata-chan, what's wrong?"

She coughed and began whimpering again as the tears began to pour against her will. He sat there patiently, eyes full of concern, as she slowly faced him. "I-I-I am so-so sorry you ha-had to see me like th-this..." she breathed. She looked into his eyes, which were still completely focused on her.

'_Three years ago I would've fainted if this happened_,' she thought, rubbing her eyes, trying to stop the flow of tears. '_If Naruto had come and sat down next to me and put his arm around me, I couldn't have kept calm_.' Her attempt failed, and the tears spilled over her face, as she sat, hunched over and continued to cry.

'_Oh my gosh_,' he thought, gazing intentively at Hinata, '_something really horrible must've happened at the Hyuuga's place to make Hinata so upset_.'

He reached his free hand to her face and lifted it up in his direction. She stopped crying, though the tears did not stop pouring, and looked at him. '_I'm a complete mess_,' she thought. '_How could I ever let this happen as a Konoha shinobi_?'

He stared very seriously into Hinata's eyes, scanning over her whole face, hot and wet from crying. "Hinata, _what happened_?" By now he was very concerned, for even though Hinata did not reserve her emotions, she never broke out in any way. Not in anger, confusion or sadness.

She finally steadied her breath and fought back the tears enough to speak. Small streams of tears ran down her face, and she would have sharp intakes of breath every once in a while, but Naruto could tell she was trying.

"W-well," she started, drawing in a long breath, "I was f-fine just about a-an hour ago, but" she choked, clenching her teeth as more tears started running down her face, "But th-then Kiba knocked on m-my window, my b-bedr-bedroom window, and," she was talking a lot faster now, "he j-just wanted to t-t-talk for a while."

She finally relaxed her face a little, taking in a long, calm breath and exhaling loudly. She lifted her face back up, looking at the sky and continued. "S-so, we were just s-sitting on my bed talking f-f-for a while when I-I heard N... Ne... N..." she began to cry again, the tears foricbly coming out of her eyes.

'_Those beautiful, shining eyes_,' Naruto thought. Her tears made them much prettier, the lavender really stuck out on a dark night such as this, and Naruto just wanted to keep looking at them forever. He then realized that he'd been staring so dreamily at her eyes, he forgot the actual situation.

"You heard... who?" He said, once again concerned, forgetting the sidetrack of her eyes. '_They are so pretty though_,' he thought. She was barely holding back the sobs, but she finally looked over to Naruto.

"N-Neji, Neji, he woke up. I-I think he heard me or K-K-Kiba laugh, and he-he... he..." she started crying again, but now she didn't wait for the tears to stop flowing before she spoke again. "Naruto, he hurt Kiba. R-really, really b-b-bad," She put her face in her hands again, crying loudly.

"And-and.." she whimpered, "He s-said if he ever ca-caught me around K-Kiba again so late, h-he'd k-k-kill him!" she let the tears run down her face. "And then..." she whispered, hatred now accompanied the sadness in her voice, the tears now burning at her face, "T-then he said i-it was merely his d-d-duty as a branch family m-member to protect m-me."

She had her brow furrowed and teeth tightly clenched in anger, her fists were turning white because she was holding them so tight. Naruto just sat in shock. "What the hell gave him the idea he had any right to go and get into your business?" Naruto said, a flame in his voice.

"I thought I taught him a lesson way back when, during those preliminaries," he had a lot of anger in his voice now, too. "I thought I taught him real good." He slowly stood, drawing Hinata's attention. "Maybe.." he whispered, "Maybe he needs another lesson," he turned and started to walk in the direction of the Hyuuga complex when she grabbed his wrist.

"N-Naruto..." she said softly, "You don't undersand." She once again let the tears roll down her face. "H-he... he really does have to... n-now, anyways... I-I don't really know how to say it, b-but," she bit her bottom lip and closed her eyes, and Naruto turned to face her.

"W-we... we're... engaged n-now." More tears ran down her face as Naruto stood, shocked. "I don't w-want to, but Hiashi decided f-for us... since Neji has such p-pure Hyuuga blood and I'm in the m-m-main family..." she began to shake her head. "I wanted to stop Neji, i-in fact, I activated his s-seal for a moment,"

Naruto looked horrified that Hinata would go to such a length. She didn't seem like she could ever do something so terrible. "B-but, once I s-stopped, he told me..." she sobbed again, "a-and said now that t-the plans had b-been made, even protecing m-my personal life w-was his job. He really only d-did it because he was j-jealous of Kiba, I-I-I know..."

Naruto stood, frozen, as the impact of her words set in him. He didn't hide the fact that he was shocked, in fact, it was quite obvious. His mouth was open, his eyes were wide and his eyebrows were highly angled. Hinata stood up and walked over to him, and let her hand slide down his wrist to rest in his palm.

"N-Naruto..." she started, hesitation now apparent on her face, "It was you that... t-that I..." she began tapping her lower lip with her free hand. "W-well... I love... _y-you_." She leaned in to his face and kissed his cheek, then turned and ran in the other direction, her hand delicately sliding out of his.

Tears again filled her eyes as she ran aimlessly, leaving a very confused Naruto behind. He lightly placed his hand on his cheek, where she had kissed him. He looked at his fingertips as if they should be giving him some kind of answer. He slowly averted his eyes to the cold, empty street that lie before him and now wished he had done somthing more when Hinata was in his grasp.

She had no idea where to go; she was _not_ going back home, and she couldn't go to Kiba's. Those two were absolutely out of the question. She didn't even know where Shino lived, and it wouldn't be a very comfortable stay as far as she could guess. She wasn't going to Naruto's, not after what just happened, and she could only think of one other place...

She lightly tapped on a veiled window, desperate for a reply of some sort. No luck. She tapped again, pressing her ear against the glass. Still, no luck. She drew back and sighed, closing her eyes, and again, the involuntary tears dripped down her face. '_Not even Sakura is awake at this time_,' she thought, thumping her forehead, '_of course_...'

Suddenly she was being swept through the air, she had no idea how, but someone had jumped up and snatched her from her rooftop perch. She had her eyes tightly shut, and was desperately clinging to whoever had grabbed her to avoid falling. She opend her eyes, hoping that it was anyone except...

"Hinata-sama," a deep voice taunted, "is it such a surprise to see me?"

Neji. He had most likely followed her and watched her from a distace until now. She swelled with anger and struck his chest, pushing herself from him. He did a backflip and neatly landed on the side of a building. "My, my..." he clicked his tongue, "someone isn't too happy to see me."

Hinata had just fallen to the ground, she landed on her feet, but then slid to her knees and began crying again.

"Happy? _Happy_?" She was now shouting, unable to hold back her emotion, "Who could be happy to see _you_?!" She realized she was back at the same street she had been when she crossed paths with Naruto.

She looked down the lane and was horrified. Neji smirked when he saw her reaction. "How's my handywork?" he said evilly as Hinata got up and sprinted to the end of the street. "You-you..." Naruto was laying on the ground, blood pooling near his face, coming from his mouth.

"Can't have anything spoiling the Hyuuga blood, now can we?"

She put her two fingers on his neck to check for a pulse. There was a very faint one, but it was slow and getting slower by the second. She began crying out in loud sobs as she pushed on his chest, trying to get him to breathe. "Naruto!" she yelled at his face, checking again for his pulse, and getting less successful results.

"_Naruto_!" she cried out one last time, his pulse fading to nothing. She pushed hard on his chest a couple more times and the rest her hand on his face. He was getting colder, paler, and the pool of blood was growing. She collapsed onto his chest and sobbed into her crossed arms for what seemed like an eternity before actually looking up again.

Neji had walked and now was crouched, just a few feet from the scene. He tauntingly stuck out his lower lip, pretending to cry. "Oh, _so_ young... Twenty-one, was he? Yes..." he placed a finger on his chin and closed his eyes. "_How_ tragic..." He lightly shook his head back and forth, mocking her.

"You..." she whispered, a force of fury in her voice, "you will _pay_ for what you have done!" she shouted, rising powerfully. Neji raised an eyebrow in dumb questioning. "And just what will _you_ do about it? I have merely protected you from this..." he gestured at Naruto's body, "threat." He smirked. "What _can_ you do, really is the question."

"I can do this..." she said, raising her two fingers in front of her face and glowering at Neji still crouched next to Naruto. His eyes widened suddenly and he screamed as Hinata yelled, "Seal: activate!"

Beads of sweat began to form on his face and hands, he gripped the sides of his head tight as Hinata stood before him, watching him squirm and cry out in pain. He shook his head back and forth, back and forth furiously, trying to rid his head of the pain. "You have done NOTHING to protect me!" she bellowed at him as he cowered in excruciating pain on the cobblestone below her.

"You have only caused me _pain_ and _misery_!" She yelled, choking back more sobs as the tears flung off of her face. He gasped out, the pain fading as Hinata lowered her hands.

"P-please..." he breathed, "No... no more, please..." He turned over on his side, panting, and drenched in sweat. He turned his head and faced her, tears in his eyes, too.

"No." she said solemnly, "You have earned much, _much_ more punishment, Neji..." She began to raise her fingers back up as Neji cowered below. "NO! PLEASE! HINATA!" he pleaded as she raised her hands again. His seal burned in his head and he began shouting out in pain.

She simply stood and watched her fiancé tremble and writhe on the ground, gasping and crying out in pain. He was dying. "Good..." she whispered to herself, focusing her chakra into her hands. Neji screamed out and began pulling his hair, trying to do anything that might rid him of the growing pain. She kept her hands up to her face as she watched the life being drained from him.

She put more power into it and he screamed, hunching over on his knees, now completely soaked. She lowered her hands quickly, right before he was about to die. "Anything you'd like to say to me?" she whispered, leaning in close to his face.

"I-I-I" he gasped out, panting, his wet face shining in the thin sunlight that was dawning. "I'm... I'm sorry..." he panted, turning over on his back, completely out of energy.

"Good," she spat, raising her hands one last time as Neji screamed and clasped his head again. "I'M SORRY!" he pleaded, the breath quickly being drawn from his lungs. Hinata realized her face was soaking wet with tears from the trauma of the night.

Neji gasped out his last words as he looked into his cousin's eyes. "I... I'm sorry..." He then lifted his weary hand up to Hinata's face before choking out one last time. His hand fell dully to the ground and his head lolled to one side. His eyes rolled into the back of his head and his eyelids drooped.

Hinata turned and placed a finger on her pouted out lower lip. "_So_ young," she cooed, clicking her tongue. "Pity."

* * *

_All characters and settings (c) Masashi Kishimoto. Hope you enjoyed._


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